3:30 So Joab and his brother Abishai killed Abner, because he had killed their brother Asahel in Gibeon during the battle.
3:31 David instructed Joab and all the people who were with him, “Tear your clothes! Put on sackcloth! Lament before Abner!” Now King David followed 1 behind the funeral bier. 3:32 So they buried Abner in Hebron. The king cried loudly 2 over Abner’s grave and all the people wept too. 3:33 The king chanted the following lament for Abner:
“Should Abner have died like a fool?
3:34 Your hands 3 were not bound,
and your feet were not put into irons.
You fell the way one falls before criminals.”
All the people 4 wept over him again. 3:35 Then all the people came and encouraged David to eat food while it was still day. But David took an oath saying, “God will punish me severely 5 if I taste bread or anything whatsoever before the sun sets!”
3:36 All the people noticed this and it pleased them. 6 In fact, everything the king did pleased all the people. 3:37 All the people and all Israel realized on that day that the killing of Abner son of Ner was not done at the king’s instigation. 7
3:38 Then the king said to his servants, “Do you not realize that a great leader 8 has fallen this day in Israel? 3:39 Today I am weak, even though I am anointed as king. These men, the sons of Zeruiah, are too much for me to bear! 9 May the Lord punish appropriately the one who has done this evil thing!” 10
1 tn Heb “was walking.”
2 tn Heb “lifted up his voice and wept.” The expression is a verbal hendiadys.
3 tc The translation follows many medieval Hebrew manuscripts and several ancient versions in reading “your hands,” rather than “your hand.”
4 tc 4QSama lacks the words “all the people.”
5 tn Heb “Thus God will do to me and thus he will add.”
6 tn Heb “it was good in their eyes.”
7 tn Heb “from the king.”
8 tn Heb “a leader and a great one.” The expression is a hendiadys.
9 tn Heb “are hard from me.”
10 tn Heb “May the